We all know the rhyme and, thanks to Toby Marlow and Lucy Moss, many more are starting to learn who the women behind ‘Divorced, beheaded, died, divorced, beheaded, survived’ were. But how much of Six is actually historically accurate?

Short answer: A fair amount.

But, of course, I can’t leave it there. Before we get to the answer, please know that in no way is this a criticism of Six—I love the show and, besides, I doubt any criticism of mine would be valid anyway, given that I haven’t seen it… Thanks covid 😒

I have, however, listened to the soundtrack many times over (I have it on loop as I write) and I have vicariously seen it through youtube videos, which has to count for something, right?

One thing Six immediately gets right is the wives of Henry VIII have always been ‘just one word in a stupid rhyme’ and that ‘All [you] ever hear and read about/Is our ex and the way it ended’. Until very recently, they were reduced to the rhyme, and sometimes even turned into the villain against Henry. Now, the likes of Alison Weir and Lucy Worsley are setting the record straight, but Six has brought the ‘true’ story to the masses in the form of a short, fun pop musical with a soundtrack that is, frankly, composed entirely of certified bangers. 

Of course, Marlow and Moss did take creative liberties, but what they have written is a lot closer to reality than the Henry-centric narrative. So, without further ado, let’s get into it.

Catherine of Aragón – A Paragon of Royalty

Catherine and Henry’s marriage, lasting twenty-four years, was, arguably, the most successful of the six. ‘Successful’ being a relative term—I’d class surviving the marriage at all as a success. As the show states, Catherine was the most qualified of them to be queen, being the daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain and having received a royal education. 

Henry, just seventeen at the time of their marriage (Catherine was twenty-three), adored her, and he showered affection upon their daughter, Mary. Catherine was pretty, clever, and a wise queen—Henry trusted her so far as to make her regent while he campaigned in France. She was also the model of regality; despite knowing about Henry’s affairs (and his son by Elizabeth Blount), she ‘didn’t say a word’. As a result, she was popular with and loved by the English people—a significant contrast to the bitter, religiously uptight, foreign woman who we hear about today.

Six gives us a queenly, composed, yet passionate woman who fights back against her divorce. In real life, Catherine did do this, leading to her banishment from the Tudor court. She claims ‘I’ll be queen till the end of my life’; Catherine never gave up her principles and called herself Henry’s only legitimate queen until her death in 1536, aged 50.

Anne Boleyn – ‘That’ Boleyn Girl

Anne Boleyn has become possibly the most (in)famous of Henry’s wives, with modern-day audiences being fascinated by her; just a few months ago, Anne Boleyn aired on Channel 5 with Jodie Turner-Smith in the titular role. There’s also The Tudors (Natalie Dormer), The Other Boleyn Girl (Natalie Portman; based on a book by Philippa Gregory), Wolf Hall (Clare Foy), and now Six.

So why does Anne intrigue us so much? Possibly in part because she provides a striking contrast to her predecessor (at least, the ‘mythical’ versions of them)—younger, livelier, and more scandalous, she is seen as everything Catherine wasn’t.

Anne’s image doesn’t actually get a huge makeover in Six. She is still the sexy, slightly devious woman we know today (with a modern twist, of course!) though Marlow and Moss do take time to make her seem more innocent in her downfall than perhaps previously portrayed. 

The real Anne was sharply clever and, yes, she was physically attractive. She was not a saint, but nor was she the villain her enemies made her out to be (a view, which, unfortunately, stuck). And, did she really commit adultery? Six says she was guilty of flirting ‘with a guy or three’, but in reality? Eh. It’s debatable at best.

In the end, Anne was likely neither wholly guilty or wholly innocent in her execution. Her song in Six may not tell the full story, but it is, in my humble opinion, one of the best in the musical.

(Plus, her claim that Henry couldn’t ‘get it up’ may have a note of truth in it…)

Jane Seymour – The Only One He Truly Loved?

‘Boring’ is the word that comes to mind when I think about how history has painted Jane. Her entire personality is pretty much a blank, with the general consensus that she was quiet, gentle and demure. As for her introduction in the musical, was Jane ‘the only one he truly loved’?

Well, it’s true that she was the only one of Henry’s queens to receive a queen’s funeral, and the king was buried beside her when he died years later. Henry also named her his ‘one true wife’ and openly grieved her death, but we do have to wonder how much of it was because Jane gave him his long-desired son, Edward.

As Jane sings, ‘Without my son your love could disappear’. After all, Henry had also loved both of his previous wives; both bore him daughters, and both were cast aside. 

Heart of Stone also implies that Jane had an undying love for Henry, which may or may not be true. Henry was her only husband, so that part is correct; though, perhaps, the ‘heart of stone’ is referring more to Jane’s quiet patience and resilience, which certainly contributed to her survival as Henry’s wife. It is generally considered likely that, had Jane lived, they would have remained married for some time, but, of course, she died twelve days after Edward’s birth of complications. (Another, more basic change in the musical; Henry was never able to ‘hold us [Jane and Edward] close for the world to see’, as, to put it bluntly, Jane was dead).

Six turns Jane’s life into a power ballad, which certainly reflects her status as Henry’s allegedly most favoured wife. 

Anne of Cleves – Queen of the Castle

Anne, sadly, has gone down in history as the ugly wife. We know the story—Henry decided to marry Anne based on her portrait by Hans Holbein, the portrait turned out to be ‘inaccurate’, Henry then sought a quick divorce, apparently unable to bear sleeping with her.

It is worth noting at this juncture that, at the time of their marriage, Henry was approaching fifty and hardly a great beauty himself. 

Reducing a woman to her looks is a distressingly familiar problem. In reality, Anne proved herself to be smart and more than capable of surviving—she was the last surviving wife, dying just over ten years after Henry. 

The fault for her marriage’s failure did not lie with Anne, and it does appear that she was better off after the divorce than before it. Due to her willingness to divorce (unlike Catherine of Aragón), she remained close with Henry, becoming known as his ‘Beloved Sister’ and often visited court for the rest of his reign. The divorce settlement ended with Anne being given two houses, and she was able to lease multiple manor houses using her own wealth. She also never married again.

Get Down is an upbeat song about a woman who flies solo and who don’t need no man. Anne is portrayed as fun, confident, and flirty—is this the truth? Well, who knows? But I think it’s a definite improvement from ‘Flanders Mare’.

Katherine Howard – The Ten Among These Threes

Katherine Howard is the queen whose story has seen the most dramatic change in recent years, including in Six. For years, her legacy has been that of a slut and a harlot, but those narratives seem to miss out the fact that Katherine was just nineteen (at most; her birthdate is uncertain) when she was beheaded. She was seventeen when she married Henry. He was forty-nine.

Nowadays, it’s easy to see exactly what is wrong with that, yet it doesn’t seem to stop us from casting judgement on Katherine for what are seen as her previous ‘indiscretions’.

I repeat: she was a child. 

Six’s Katherine is flirty and fun-loving, but she is also tragically young and innocent, and All You Wanna Do is guaranteed to pull at emotions despite it’s boppy beat and innuendo-filled lyrics. Through it, Katherine lays out her ‘affairs’, starting with her music teacher, Henry Manox, who molested her when she was thirteen (Manox was thirty-six, though Six says he was twenty-three). When we take into account her age, the lyrics scream manipulation and abuse—but, of course, a thirteen year old girl was entirely capable of seducing a fully-grown, adult man.

The story repeats with the next man, Francis Dereham. Some have claimed that Katherine did make advances on Dereham, but, again, she was incredibly young. Further, the key to the dormitory Katherine slept in along with other ladies’ maids was readily accessible, and Dereham ‘won’t take no’, according to Six.

Henry was old, fat, cruel, and entirely inappropriate as a husband to a young girl. Nevertheless, Katherine, anxious to please her family, accepted her lot and married him. Katherine is said to have loved the luxury she found at court (the Howard family were relatively impoverished), but her downfall came just over a year after the marriage, when evidence was found of an affair with Thomas Culpepper.

Whether this affair actually took place is debated, though it is more likely to have happened than Anne Boleyn’s affairs. Six portrayed their relationship as platonic on Katherine’s side, but Culpepper wanted more, driving Katherine to despair (the show stops the song to show Katherine breaking down in front of the audience). Whatever the case—can you really blame her? In a court filled with older men and an aging husband, is it such a crime to want companionship, whether that be friendly or more?

I say not. But, then, I’m biased. Katherine is, after all, my favourite, if you couldn’t tell. 😁

Catherine Parr – The Survivor

The final wife, who outlived Henry by over a year (though she wasn’t the only one, as I’ve already mentioned). History remembers her as a nurse, a loyal wife, and a kind stepmother who reconciled the king with his two daughters.

Some of this is true; Catherine gave up her planned marriage to Thomas Seymour for the king, and she did help to reinstate Elizabeth and Mary in the line of succession. But she was also so much more.

As she states in Six, Catherine wrote prayer books and published them in her own name, advocated for reformation in the church, had diplomatic influence equal to Catherine of Aragón, and she did fight ‘for female education’. Some of the feminist statements in I Don’t Need Your Love are exaggerated and it probably would be incorrect to label Catherine as any sort of Tudor feminist, but she was an intelligent powerhouse of a woman, and she deserves respect as her own person, just as all of these women do.

Six may not be entirely accurate, but it is incredibly entertaining, and you are guaranteed to learn something upon seeing it (or, if you’re like me, from listening to the soundtrack).

Sources:

• https://www.historyextra.com/period/tudor/the-six-wives-in-a-different-light/
• https://www.historyextra.com/period/tudor/henry-six-wives-guide-who-were-they-how-many-spouse-catherine-aragon-anne-boleyn-jane-seymour-anne-cleves-howard-parr-facts/
• https://www.playbill.com/article/what-you-need-to-know-about-the-real-queens-of-the-six-musical
• https://www.cheatsheet.com/entertainment/how-accurate-is-six-the-musical-when-it-comes-to-the-ex-wives-of-henry-viii.html/